Chapter 258

Just when the players were passive and their morale was getting lower and lower, Li Mu and Pei Hong suddenly heard a loud shouting in the sea behind them. They turned their heads and were so surprised that they forgot about the pirates in front of them.

If it weren't for Lin Haiyang's crossbow cart that was still helping them to clear the pirates nearby, they would probably have been injured.

"Teacher Li, don't just be surprised. Look at what's in front of you. You know my skills can't last long!" Lin Haiyang shouted loudly out of the wooden window while shooting.

Li Mu, who came to his senses, immediately drew his bow and continued shooting, and patted Pei Hong beside him.

"Brother Li, what's the situation? Did you invite foreign aid? Do you have a backup plan? You are really patient." Pei Hong chopped the pirate in front of him and looked sideways at the people around him.

"How is that possible? At this time, those who can come here have already come here. How can there be any backup plan?" Li Mu shook his head, indicating that he did not call these people here.

Those players reached the shore as quickly as possible, and then rushed to the pirate island with weapons to join the battle. When they helped the wounded down, they would say sorry for being late, which confused the players who had been fighting. They could only reply to them to be careful. It

was not until Qiao Sheng and Fang Yueyi had a good rest that they took the cassock and Jinlan and others to get off the boat and fight on the island again that someone solved this mystery for Pei Hong and Li Mu.

It turned out that Xia Beibei had gone to the World Channel to demonstrate her appeal as player number 88. The effect of her usual brushing of the World Channel to make herself familiar with other players finally came into play at this time.

When Qiao Sheng and the others went back, Xia Beibei and Lin Haiyang also began to take turns to rest. Qiao Sheng had no idea about the number of players, but she, a player who would hang out on the World Channel whenever she had time, had some idea.

So she took advantage of the break to go on the World Channel again. She first severely criticized the players who were not present, then described the battle situation as extremely tragic, and finally raised the level to the moment of life and death for mankind. The main content and central idea of ​​this summary were so concise.

Finally, she began to call on the players not to be deserters, but to work together. It didn't matter if they died, as long as one person was alive, they would have a resurrection scroll! It doesn't matter whether you are alive or not in the game, as long as you can go home and live in reality.

When she first refreshed the screen, the world channel was almost silent. It was not until Qiao Sheng and the others had eaten that someone replied on the world channel. It was Li Mu's owner No. 666, who said that their fleet of 2,000 people was on the way. They were not deserters, but they were too poor. They

had never been able to open the coordinates. Finally, with more than 2,000 people gathered, they finally got a ship together to open the map. Now there is only one ship leading the way, and the other ships are working hard to mark the way. It won't be far, and they will reach the battlefield in a few hours.

Xia Beibei was a little embarrassed by the words of player 666. After all, she just went up and attacked indiscriminately, which was considered as no harm to the friendly forces.

At this time, other players seemed to have been scolded by her and said that they were nearby and would rush over as quickly as possible.

Xia Beibei then smiled and said that she didn't expect that she still had the potential for PUA.

Qiao Sheng and Fang Yueyi could only give her a thumbs up.

Knowing the whole story, Li Mu and Pei Hong also admired this little girl a little bit. She solved things that they, the adults, couldn't do easily.

With the reinforcements, the players' strength increased greatly, and the battle was no longer one-sided. Both sides had come and gone.

Li Mu's wheel battle was implemented again. Xia Beibei and Lin Haiyang almost never got off the boat. They were always in charge of fire support on the boat, and they had to take turns to make Baibaodan for Pei Hong's team doctor.

When Li Mu came back to rest, he adjusted the speed of the boat to the fastest, and then filled the greenhouse where they slept with planting pots, specifically for growing Panax notoginseng.

Even so, there was not enough to use, and this was the result of the team doctor controlling the dosage from the beginning, otherwise it would have been insufficient.

In the end, there was really no other way. Panax notoginseng was raised from players. A piece of it was made into Baibao Dan, which was handed over to the team doctor to treat the wounded. The logistics department of Pei Hong's fleet has now been changed to a medical team.

Grandma Chu brought Zheng Xi and several little girls to run around. Even Wen Ning, the little girl, would hold a hot water bottle to feed water to the wounded. Ji Ya tied her second son on her back, helped cut cotton cloth as a bandage, and occasionally shook her son to comfort him.

Everyone was mobilized. As more and more players came from behind, the battle lasted for three days and three nights. The players relied on drugs to complete this battle of defeating the majority with fewer people.

After killing the last pirate in front of her, Qiao Sheng could hardly hold the sword in her hand, and she collapsed on the ground gasping for breath. In these three days, she slept for less than five hours in total. Except for the time for eating and healing, she was almost always in the front line of the battle.

At the end of the killing, there was only one sentence in her mind, which was "I want to go home! 】Jiashazi and Jinlan were black, and only their fur was seen stuck together. It was unclear whether it was the pirates' blood or their own. Xinxinbaba and Yousu were lighter in color, and their bodies were even more unsightly. However, her own wounds were very obvious.

"I was seriously injured this time. My face was burning all the time, and it was disfigured from time to time." Qiao Sheng felt that sitting on the ground was cold and hard, so she moved and leaned on Jiashazi.

This guy also knew her well, and deliberately exposed his belly for her to lean on, which was a little cleaner.

"I can't tell where you have any wounds. If you put a crescent moon on your face, you can pretend to be Bao Zheng. It doesn't seem to make much difference whether you are disfigured or not." Fang Yueyi also fell to the ground and panted. The battles in the past few days really exhausted them all.

"You're still talking about me. How can you be any better? You still have a dark face." Qiao Sheng couldn't help but grin with his big white teeth at this time. He had no strength in his body, and even his smile was a little weak.

"What are you laughing at? Why don't you take me with you." Xia Beibei saw the end of the battle and ran down from the boat. She just caught up with her two sisters and grinned.

"You said we have dark faces, but now you are the most beautiful among the three of us." Fang Yueyi looked up and said to her.

Xia Beibei didn't care whether it was clean or not at this moment. She quickly supported her two sisters and took the animal team back to the boat. They were probably exhausted and had difficulty standing.

In the end, Xu Ziyan came to help. He and Xia Beibei each carried one of them back to the boat.

Li Mu came over to show concern. He really didn't have time to take care of these personal matters. Qiao Sheng also asked him to quickly discuss with Pei Hong about cleaning up the battlefield and looking for hidden pirates. After all, up to now, neither the game announcement nor Qiao Sheng's system private chat said that the pirates had been cleared out. Maybe some of them were still at large.

All the pirates must be killed on the island. If any of them escape, their mission of clearing out the pirates may not be completed. The duck in their mouth flew away. It would be difficult to find them later. In the vast ocean, looking for pirates is no different from picking up needles.

After making sure that everyone at home was fine, Li Mu left to clean up the mess.

Under his and Pei Hong's arrangement, the wounded were well treated, because those who survived had no injuries to vital parts. Basically, they took medicine, restored their health bars, and applied medicine to external injuries, and they would be healed in a few days.

It was just that everyone's energy and physical strength were a little bit off after the car battle.

Li Mu specially selected players who were in good condition and had strong combat power to clean up the last pirate island. The other players didn't have to do anything now, and hurried back to their own ships to heal, eat, wash, and sleep. The biggest task now was to rest.

As more and more players came to support, the sea area south of the pirates was full of ships. Later, no one knew who came up with the idea to line up the players' ships, with the south as the center and spread out to both sides, to surround the island as much as possible, just to prevent the pirates from escaping from an unguarded place.

This idea is good, but the island is really too big. After lining up for a long time, they can still only surround a small half of the island. Pei Hong said that this is very good. When they clean up later, they can split into several teams from the north to clear back to the south.

Players are also left to clean up the battlefield in the south to prevent pirates from pretending to be dead and escaping.

Facts proved that what they thought was right. There were pirates pretending to be dead on the battlefield, but they were all dealt with by Lin Haiyang and his men. Li Mu and his cleaning team did not even let go of the mountains in the north, and they really searched for pirates inch by inch.

Qiao Sheng and the others ate, washed themselves, and hurried to catch up on sleep. When they woke up again, they were completely awakened by hunger. Only after eating did they stabilize their hunger and health bars.

They slept for a whole day, and joined the cleaning team from the second day, replacing Li Mu and Pei Hong and others to go back and rest.

The cleaning work lasted for two days, and solved more than 200 fugitive pirates, but even so, the game still did not issue an announcement.

This made the players panic. After all, they had done everything they could. Everyone wondered if there was something hidden in the mission conditions.

Just as they were worrying, they suddenly remembered that there was an underground on the island. They mobilized everyone to search for a day before finding the entrance under the bed of a wooden house in the Combat Pirate Camp.

Because the situation in the tunnel was unclear, the number of people who could go down was limited to 30. If the situation was not good, they would immediately contact Pei Hong who was guarding above.

Li Mu would lead the team to go down, and Qiao Sheng, Fang Yueyi, Xia Beibei and others would definitely follow. Even the animal team, whose fur was shaved off to bandage the wounds, had to follow.

The strongest group of people all went down, and the tunnel was completely dark. Those who had torches held torches, and those who had lanterns held lanterns. Li Mu walked in front, with Ah Dai squatting on his shoulder. The tunnel was too low to fly.

The little eagle squatted on Lin Haiyang's shoulder, which made him very excited. Whenever he had something to do, he would take some snacks from Xia Beibei's purse to feed the little eagle. After all, this guy would either kiss Ah Dai or play with Li Mu. If it weren't for Ah Dai on Li Mu's shoulder, it would never be Lin Haiyang's turn to get close to it.

This underground space was much larger than they imagined. After all, it could accommodate tens of thousands of pirates. However, they had been walking in it for most of the day and could not even bear the hunger pangs. They were forced to rest and replenish their hunger pangs.

Because there were so many people, Qiao Sheng would definitely not take food from the ring space. Instead, he took the pancakes that Lin Haiyang had baked and a large piece of wild boar meat in sauce. These were previously placed in the ring space. Qiao Sheng moved them to his backpack before entering the tunnel. At this time, they were no longer warm, but they were not as hard as if they had been stored for a long time.

"Hurry up and try my brother's cooking. It was just made this morning. The wild boar has been marinated for half a night. It must be tasty." Lin Haiyang was also quick to react. He knew what was going on as soon as he got it in his hands and quickly said it out. Otherwise,

it would be a bit unreasonable to eat dry food at room temperature in this cold winter.

After eating and resting, they continued to search for pirates in this underground maze. After entering, they had no concept of time. In addition to relying on the hunger bar to keep time, they relied on the emails sent by Pei Hong outside. He would send an email to ask about the situation every once in a while, and Li Mu would answer again and again that he had not

found any pirates. They spent another two days underground and did not see a single pirate until Pei Hong found the underground map above, which gave them a general direction.

Li Mu, Xu Ziyan and Shen Li were studying the map. Qiao Sheng and the others were determined not to participate in this kind of activity. Remembering the route was too difficult. They were used to being at the forefront of the battle.

Soon Li Mu and the others drew out three places they had not been to. After studying, they were ready to try their luck in the only secret room on the map.

It was far from here, but with the map, at least they would not go the wrong way. After walking for most of the day, they finally arrived at that place. I don’t know if the sound of their footsteps was particularly obvious in the silence of the underground, but before they got close to the secret room, they heard crying and a woman’s muffled groaning inside.

Qiao Sheng and the others immediately became alert and walked cautiously to the door of the secret room. They were originally prepared to violently dismantle the stone door of the secret room, but they didn't expect that the door was not locked, but only half-closed.

Li Mu was in the front and slowly pushed open the stone door. There was an oil lamp on in the secret room. Although it was dim, it was still clear.

The layout was very simple, with a stone table, two stone benches, a stone bed, and a lot of canned supplies and buckets in the corners.

A woman was lying on the bed with a crying baby beside her. If it weren't for the blood left on the edge of the bed, they would have thought the woman was asleep.

"What does this mean? Did she commit suicide because she felt she couldn't beat us?" Lin Haiyang walked over, reached out to feel the woman's breathing and pulse on the bed, and confirmed that she was dead.

"Still so pretentious, if you want to commit suicide, then commit suicide, and commit suicide, you are showing off." Xia Beibei made a face at him and complained.

Before the two of them had time to continue arguing, they found that everyone else in the room was silently looking at the person on the bed. It was too quiet, and they chose to keep quiet uncomfortably.

"It's not that they can't beat us, but this mother left a way out for her child." Qiao Sheng walked over and took the child out of the bed, patting him gently.

The child was probably not hungry or wet, and he was crying because he was not sure if he was sleepy or because his mother's death made him uneasy. Under Qiao Sheng's patting, he actually stopped crying and fell asleep.

"Perhaps in her mind, only if she dies, we will be able to let this child who knows nothing go. She is also gambling. If she wins, she will leave a way for the child. If she loses, she will go to the underworld to wait for the child anyway." Qiao Sheng explained to Xia Beibei, who looked confused.

"It's not easy to be a mother, but there is a very important problem at hand. This female pirate is dead, and the world channel has not issued an announcement. This means that we cannot determine our victory unless this little thing is solved." Fang Yueyi sighed and told the cruel truth.

Li Mu looked at the expressions of all the players in and out of the secret room, and decided to go to the other two places he had not been to to investigate. After all, he could not be sure whether this baby was the key without going all the places.

But after they spent a whole day walking through all the places in the underground that had not been visited and did not find any pirates, they had to give up hope, which proved that this kid was really a mission point.

"Who can do this? This damn game is full of challenges for everyone! We kill pirates because they deserve to be killed, but what about this baby? He has no memory and his eyes can't even open. The point is that his mother has done so much for him! How can he do this?" Xia Beibei scratched her head and complained.

What she said is what all the players underground want to say now. People are all made of flesh and blood. Who can be so cold-blooded and heartless?

In the end, it was Li Mu who decided to go back to the ground first. This idea had to be taken by all players together, and they had no right to decide. They

returned to the ground with a heavy heart. Pei Hong was really waiting for them at the entrance of the cave. When he saw them come out, he happily asked if everything was resolved and why the game hadn't issued an announcement yet.

"It can't be launched. We have brought the last mine up here. You can see how to solve it." Lin Haiyang walked in front and pointed to the back for him to see.

Pei Hong waited until everyone came out and looked again before he saw what Qiao Sheng was holding in his arms. He couldn't help but frown when he looked out: "What's going on? Little pirate? Why did you take the child out?"

"This should be the key to completing the mission." Li Mu took the child out of Qiao Sheng's arms and stuffed it into Pei Hong's hands.

Qiao Sheng had been holding the child all the way. As soon as someone else took over, the child would start whimpering and crying. She had no choice but to hold the child all the way. In the end, Xia Beibei and Fang Yueyi took turns to hold her arms. The child was not heavy, but people couldn't stand the same posture for a long time.

Pei Hong was familiar with holding a baby. Li Mu's position was wrong, so he quickly found a comfortable position for the child and patted him to comfort him. Taking

advantage of this opportunity, Li Mu told Pei Hong what the child's mother had done. Pei Hong was also troubled after hearing it.

"Don't let the players outside know about this for now. Although they should have the right to know, it is not good to put an innocent child in danger." Pei Hong whispered without stopping his movements.

Everyone in the room agreed with this idea. Almost all the players brought into the underground this time were either Pei Hong's team members or Shen Li's team members. The advantage was that they were all obedient.

It was dark when they came out. Taking advantage of the night, several people hid here and there and returned to Pei Hong's boat.

After entering the cabin, everyone sat around the fire pot and began to discuss the future of this little guy.

"It's so annoying. We can't kill him, and he delays us from going home! I miss my mom!" Xia Beibei leaned against Baba and rubbed the lion's mane into a mess.

Everyone brainstormed for half a night, but couldn't find a solution.

"How about we find a bug, adopt him, and change his identity as a pirate. Wouldn't this be considered as eliminating all pirates in disguise? From now on, I will adopt this child!" Qiao Sheng really couldn't think of a solution, so he started to break the jar, and when he talked about adoption, he was somewhat gambler.

The next moment, the players didn't have to open the world channel, and at the same time, the game announcement appeared in front of them.

[Congratulations to the players for completing the task of clearing the pirate island. From now on, just click Exit to leave the game and return to the real world. Those players who sacrificed heroically will also return to the real world. After 15 days, all players will be forced to exit the game world. Take this time to say goodbye to your comrades around you, and take a good look at the game world you have fought for a year. After 15 days, you will return to reality and you will still be strangers.]

"Damn, Sister Qiao, you have successfully caught the bug! But what does this stranger mean? Will we forget each other?" Xia Beibei couldn't help but scream.

The joy of being able to go home was suddenly covered by a layer of haze. Outside the cabin, the players who were still cheering slowly fell into silence, probably feeling sad about the word stranger.

"There are still fifteen days. Even if we become strangers in the future, we have such similar personalities. Can we still be good friends when we meet again?" Qiao Sheng reached out and patted Xia Beibei's shoulder, asking her not to be too sad.

"The most urgent thing is that we have to solve your adopted son first. We will leave in fifteen days. Leaving him alone in this game world is no different from killing him. Your bug is also useless. I think we should send him to the island where Cao Hanmo and his friends live. After all, they are all children. We can also leave all the supplies we have saved to them. It can also be regarded as the maintenance fee for your son." Li Mu provided both the problem and the solution, which was immediately recognized by everyone.

Li Mu had recorded the coordinates, and Qiao Sheng immediately entered them to check, and then he was dumbfounded. It turned out that their current location was so far away from Cao Hanmo's island that even if they drove a driving device and kept going all the way, it would take a month. They would be ejected from the game in fifteen days. This was an impossible task.

"It's over. My adopted son may only live for another fifteen days." Qiao Sheng was caught off guard by this change and had no idea of ​​a solution.

Pei Hong first asked about Cao Hanmo's island. As soon as Li Mu explained and connected it to the timeline, Fang Yueyi guessed what happened when the coarse food was changed.

"I have a way, I don't know if it works." Pei Hong turned and walked to the corner of the cabin, took out a pottery jar, and placed it in front of everyone.

Qiao Sheng and the others also had this thing, and they immediately understood what he meant.

"I'll give this thing to you. I have only one idea. Can you help me bring Heizi over? It's smart and won't hurt anyone. Let Cao Hanmo take good care of it. This is a fighting force. But I probably can't afford Heizi's upbringing. In the past year or so, I have a lot of supplies, but I have been taking so many people in and out, and there's actually nothing left." Pei Hong smiled bitterly and pushed the pottery jar over.

With this speed doubling, but I don't know if it can be stacked, maybe they can really get rid of this bug.

"Come on, sisters, let's hug each other. You will be on your way soon and we probably won't see each other again. My senior brother and I will leave in a while. We have some food and supplies. Please help me hand them over to Cao Hanmo. The only request is that you send our big and stupid Jinlan over as well. It's smarter than Captain Pei's Heizi. Remember to introduce it like this. Our Jinlan must have a place." Fang Yueyi reached out and hugged Qiao Sheng and Xia Beibei, then hurried back to her boat to pack up supplies.

Pei Hong shouted from behind: "Nonsense, I'm old, but I'm not deaf! Don't think I can't hear you if you lower your voice! Our Heizi is the smartest!"

Everyone said goodbye briefly. Qiao Sheng and his companions returned to their boat first because they were in a hurry to get on the road. Behind them were Jinlan and Heizi who were chased over by Pei Hong and Fang Yueyi.

The cassock boy was very affectionate to the two brothers. Although they grew up in different places, they could always see each other from time to time, so they were not strangers.

Fang Yueyi asked them to sail away first, and the supplies would be mailed over, and asked Qiao Sheng to pay attention to check the mail.

Time was tight and the mission was heavy, so Qiao Sheng and his companions turned the boat around immediately after getting on the boat and headed towards the island of Cao Hanmo and his companions at full speed.

Facts have proven that no matter what game it is, there is always room for bugs. The gratitude of the two jar islanders can allow them to quadruple their speed, so a journey that would take thirty days can most likely be completed in fifteen days.

Two days after they left, Qiao Sheng received a large amount of supplies from Fang Yueyi. Not only physical objects, but also a bunch of wooden boards and iron products. The most important thing is that the quantity is not small, which puzzled her. With this amount of supplies, how could their fleet still lack large arrows?

[Shut up, they dismantled all my ships. My senior brother and I are now standing on Lao Pei’s ship to rub the stove. We don’t even have cotton clothes! I also dismantled a few ownerless ships along the way. I didn’t expect that the pirates I eliminated would do robbery again, all for the orphans. My sacrifice is too great. I won’t say more, my dear sister. I hope we can still be friends when we meet again in the future. Love you, Yueyi. 】

After that, the names of Fang Yueyi and Xu Ziyan disappeared completely from Qiao Sheng's friend list. It seemed that they had left the game.

During the journey, the four people talked most about who had disappeared from the list, and their moods became increasingly depressed.

Qiao Sheng and Li Mu were fine. The two younger ones were in such a depressed state that they looked downcast every day. They could only comfort each other and even told each other their home addresses and mobile phone numbers as a small comfort to each other.

"It's not fair. How come the three of you are from the same city, but I'm not." Xia Beibei felt even more depressed after hearing their respective addresses. After all, the chances of meeting each other in the same city were not high, let alone someone from a different place like her.

"Beibei, you have to think like this. You will be filling out your application soon. It is very likely that you will be admitted to the school of Li Mu and Lin Haiyang. After all, their school is well-known in the country. You also said that your college entrance examination results are very good. It is not easy for you to meet them." Qiao Sheng's comfort made her feel even worse. She

cried and said what if she miscalculated her score, what if she failed to get into their school. In the end, Qiao Sheng cried so hard that he was helpless. He pointed at Lin Haiyang and asked him to solve it. After all, the more he comforted her at this time, the less effective it would be. It would be better to let him do something weird, maybe it would be more effective.

Giving them the space on the first floor of the cabin, Qiao Sheng carried You Su to the second floor, walked around the cabin, and finally went to the terrace to blow the sea breeze and calm down.

"It's so cold, why did you run here?" Not long after, Li Mu came over with a rabbit fur blanket and put it on her.

"I'm sad because of your crying, little girl. We've been together for so long, but I'm going to forget you guys soon. I feel sad." Qiao Sheng put his fingers into You Su's fur to keep warm, looking at the sea level in the distance, and said softly.

"Me too, you said we have so many bugs in this game, and it's the end. Is there a chance to have another one?" Li Mu suddenly reached out and grabbed Qiao Sheng's rabbit fur blanket that was about to slip off. I

don't know if it was to prevent it from slipping again, or for some other reason, this hand never left Qiao Sheng's shoulder.

Qiao Sheng felt his movements, tilted her head slightly to look at his trembling left hand, and turned back to look at him with a smile on her lips: "Okay, let's work hard to fix the bugs in the game and not forget each other." At

this moment, the two of them leaned against each other tightly, not knowing the future, just watching the beautiful sunset.

"Does this count as we have seen the sunrise and the sunset?" Qiao Sheng lowered his voice when he heard Lin Haiyang calling them to eat.

"Of course it counts, there will be more in the future." Li Mu suddenly tightened his hand on her shoulder, hugged her to the door of the cabin, and then let go.

In the following days, the four of them never mentioned anything about the future of the game. Every day they ate and drank, watched the scenery, played with animals, and had to feed the baby by the way. They were very busy.

The result of the crazy rush was that they arrived at Cao Hanmo's island earlier than expected.

This time, it was the old acquaintance Goudan who was on guard at the shore. Seeing their enthusiasm, although he didn't know Xia Beibei and Lin Haiyang, he immediately called his younger brother to call Cao Hanmo and Ke Junhua.

Because they arrived early, they had some time to tell Cao Hanmo and his friends some things. The first thing was to entrust the baby to them. This was not a big problem for Cao Hanmo and his wife. After all, raising children was a job they were experienced at.

Then the animal team was assigned to go out. Li Mu introduced the situation of these animals to Cao Hanmo and his wife, while Qiao Sheng took these guys aside and gave them a lecture one by one. The meaning was very clear: from now on, the master has changed. If they want to eat and drink well, they must know who is the new boss and not cause trouble.

The ones on Qiao Sheng's boat were honest, listening with their heads down, and did not make any noise. However, Heizi and Jinlan wanted to protest, but they were suppressed by a slap from the stronger monk cub.

Seeing this, Qiao Sheng was completely relieved. Her animal was big and powerful. The other two of her compatriots were no match for it. With the smart leadership of Su and A-Dai, this animal team might really become the strongest fighting force on this orphan island.

When Li Mu finished speaking, the time was almost up. They didn't even have time to dump the supplies on the boat to the village.

In order to prevent her disappearance from causing panic, Qiao Sheng first untied her boat, and then let Cao Hanmo and the others take the supplies on the boat at will. Then she asked Li Mu to build a few floating boards, and the four of them stood on the floating boards and paddled away.

Because it was already dark when they left, they held hands and disappeared into the sea, leaving only a few floating boards floating on the sea. Cao Hanmo on the shore watched them go far away before leaving. In the darkness, no one could even see when they disappeared.